Bulk of the original post from MilSig (of MilSig Industries) from one year ago:

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Hi All, consider what I'm about to show you a public safety warning. I also want to warn any paintball businesses to think twice before they order anything from this company. www.paintball-gun.cn

I'm going to show you an illustration of one of their products, and email excerpts exchanged between my purchasing agent in Taiwan, and the sales rep "Rosa" at this company.

Background Story...

For about 2 months straight, myself and my staff have received spam mail from a bunch of China based manufacturers. One of them being www.paintball-gun.cn (TMT Paintball). I don't usually read these things and I had them forwarded to my purchasing guy, Mr. Chen. We just happen to be looking for some regs as we're switching over to HPA bottles from CO2 at our rental fields. Chen shows me what looks to be a MYTH regulator and asked me if we should buy some if they were safe and usable. I then told Chen to ask for samples from TMT and he proceeded an email exchange with them.

After a few emails, Rosa told Chen that the price for the reg is $15 USD with a MOQ (Minimum Order Quantity) of 100 pcs. Rosa then offers to send a sample over, it arrived the next day via Fedex.

Chen opened the pkg and looked over the reg, everything seemed normal. He then attached it to a 13 CI alum bottle we had lying around. As it was a 4500 psi reg and a 3000psi bottle, he went down to the basement and proceeded to fill it with our 3000 psi scuba tank. He plugs in it, turns on the valve and NOTHING...air does not seem to be going in. He comes back upstairs just as I walked into the office, and he hands it over to me for a closer look.

So I took it apart and the very first thing I noticed was that the nipple wasn't a standard size. It wasn't a US sized fill nipple, nor a slightly smaller one used in Europe. It was some sort of metal that had a shiny surface plating. I then took it downstairs myself and proceeded to fill it, again nothing. I took it back upstairs and took it apart to see what the problem was.

As I broke it down, my jaw dropped. There were so few parts inside, and upon closer inspection, there were absolutely NO safety features on this reg. What is supposedly a burst disc is nothing by a piece of plated brass with a hole drilled through it. Inside of the reg, there was NOTHING that regulated the air pressure down (there's usually a series of discs and valves and "turns" the air, forcing the pressure down). The fill nipple was the same plated metal and the hole that was drilled thru it was very small. The spring valve had no slot drilled into it, so when we tried to fill it, it actually created a perfect seal inside.

The fact that this thing did NOT fill probably saved our lives. Had we achieved in filling the bottle and connected it to a marker, all 3000 psi would go right into the marker, probably blowing up the gun. We could have been seriously hurt or even killed if anything had exploded.

Chen and I were both dumbfounded once we opened this thing up, and upon realizing the danger we'd just avoided, Chen proceeded to contact Rosa to tell her our findings.

Here's the email exchange...

Rosa, I had received the sample you sent me by Fedex. I thank you very much for sending it. Upon inspection of the unit, Iím disappointed to tell you that it does not work. I had your regulator sample taken apart. Theirs is NOTHING inside that REGULATES the air pressure. I donít think your company knows anything about safety and manufacturing of products. You canít have possibly sold this product to anyone before without them telling you about it. With high pressure air, if youíre not careful, a bottle or a gun can explode. Are you trying to get someone killed?

Sincerely,

Chen Wei

Reply...

Dear Mr.Chen,

Thank you for your opinion.
We have export at least 1000pcs of this item to Other countries at before and nothing had happened. Therefore, we are very surprise when you tell me about it.
I will tell your opinion to my engineer to ask them about it.

best regards
sincerely
Rosa
April 8th

After this email exchange, I took this regulator down to my friend Mr. Sun for a closer inspection. Mr. Sun is one of the most knowledgeable Paintball experts in all of Taiwan, he owns the company that makes the mini invert, and the BT TM7. He also makes air products like regulators, fill stations, etc. He takes the reg apart and looks at it and just shakes his head. He says there's no way in hell that this regulator would work with the parts it had. He also finds it completely bogus that TMT can sell 1000 of these things without anyone getting hurt or dead...

These TMT people obviously do not have any clue how a regulator works, and what kind of danger they put someone in with the garbage they're selling. These people are not selling teddy bears, they're selling a device that is designed to control thousands of pounds of air pressure. Please do NOT support manufacturers like them by buying their products. Everything comes at a price for a reason. I hope to God that they really didn't sell 1000 of these things into Europe. If ANY of you see an online ad selling a cheap reg, stay FAR FAR AWAY!

The following is a quick illustration I made with pictures I took from my cell phone...not the best quality, but you see the actual reg they sent me.